Doctor-Alvis
Post-Crisis Balki
Originally posted by janus77
people just don't like the character, that's about all it boils down to.Hulk's feats are too high for most peoples liking, the idea that this character who normally goes about running away from the military and/or smashing up mountains is stronger (and more innately powerful) than Gods (Thor et al), flying bricks (Gladiator et al) and assorted monsters (Onslaught, X-Men etc), only makes him that much more unpalateable... he doesn't have a majestic arc like say Surfer, where he's tangled up in the wonders of the universe and looking face to face with creator/destroyer types ... he doesn't bring to life a mythos like Thor does ... he just exists to be annoyingly - incredibly - powerful and without true purpose.
Hulk destroyed technology designed to ward off Celestials, that was dismissed as meaningless.
Hulk contained and then released (without any damage to himself) 2 universes of energy - which in anyother case would be taken to mean enduring a "Big Bang" - but that is totally ignored when talking of his stamina, durability and capacity to take punishment/energy attacks (ie, so and so should "overpower him", such and such an attack would "kill him" ...)
I just think the character lacks the kind of purposive stories that drag alot of the more fanatical crowd to comics. you can't really look up to Hulk, he's just a very human man, with Godlike (more in the league of Beyonder than Odin) power ... more afraid of what he could wrought than with bringing the universe to some superior order or defending the order that already exists (Thor and Surfer).
think about it, Beyonder says Hulk's power is like his own, in magnitute (infinite), Galactus can feed off of "The Old Power" and be sustained for a thousand years, yet The Old Power is miniscule in comparison to the power exhibited by a weaker Hulk ...
if you swapped Hulk's high-end feats with say, Thor's, everybody would think Thor was truly a Skyfather... not many would be upset at the ridiculousness of those powers - because they would have a narrative purpose...
Hulk's stories are more psychological than narrative focused... they're about coming to terms with yourself, with your capabilities and desires... in their totality and about the consequences of not doing so, imo.
I kind of agree with you. I've never been able to like Hulk for any reason except his ability to look stupid while in promotional ads. He's one of the things I fear and loathe the most - a character with a limited powerset boosted to godlike levels. This is why I don't like Superman either. I keep thinking something should happen if you're just so physically strong that you can knock out characters that can warp reality. Like these characters should become so dense with strength and durability that they themselves become just like the black holes they're punching out with their fists.
They're like characters invented by children, which is semi-excusable for Hulk because, if true, he was an invention of Banner when he was a child. If not true, just as much shame on you, Hulk. But what the crap? You can just punch out time and space? Screw that. When I envision the power scale the high end drifts further away from physicality and more towards mental prowess. When a being becomes so powerful physical power should be meaningless. When I finally read Watchmen when the big Watchmen craze started up Dr. Manhattan is exactly how I pictured someone with immense power being.
Bricks like Hulk and Superman and the like make me lose faith in the gods of comics and comics in general when in those comics your left hook can become so good that you can knock out a skyfather and the skyfathers are dumb enough to let them do it. I guess I'm more disappointed in the people writing the gods. Most of them amount to a scarecrow with a number painted on them. Whichever one you hit tells you how powerful you are.
Maybe this makes a good story to a lot of people but I find it pretty pathetic.